Coming home

As it's just over a week until Christmas, I suppose it's not appropriate to still have a Happy Thanksgiving post as the most recent.

We took a little pre-Christmas get-away to Amsterdam the first weekend this month and were surprised at how much we liked the city that often gets a bad rap as only a place for less than wholesome activities.

The canals were arguably cleaner and just as attractive as those in Venice - we enjoyed a pleasant canal cruise one evening, during which we learned that the Dutch people have to take their furniture outside, use pulleys, and then move it in through the windows, because their houses are too narrow to take furniture up the stairs. Why is this? Because of tax laws, which used to tax based on the amount of space you occupied along the road. Now decades later, are you surprised that the Dutch do everything can to avoid being labeled narrow-minded?

We went to an incredible Van Gogh museum and learned a fair bit about his art and his plagued life.

We spent most of Sunday afternoon at the Anne Frank house, first touring the very rooms in which she hid and penned her diary and then sitting in a cafe downstairs reading a few chapters to refresh our memories about her journaling that brings the horrors of the Holocaust to life. Can you imagine being couped up with your family for months in hiding, followed by losing those closest to you? Perhaps that's a thought to bear in mind when the family starts to get a bit testy after a few days of Christmas break.

Tomorrow we're headed to our second wedding in this country - we'll be in the spirit for Steve and Stephanie's as well, which we're sad to miss.

We are coming home for Christmas in less than a week! Our one-horse open sleigh I think is made by Boeing. Yikes, much packing and preparation to do.

We look forward to seeing you soon.